Gun-a-Day 40: The Fearsome Glock’L’Max is Spotted in Broad Daylight

I guess 40 consecutive days of shooting is some kind of milestone, and I feel very blessed to have gotten this far into this project. Here’s to the hope for at least 325 more days’ worth. Dei gratia & Dei volente

My goal today was to test the laser in the light of day (albeit in a mostly shady spot), and the mission produced good intel. The first magazine was emptied with laser targeting, but when I reloaded I couldn’t relocate the red beam and spent the last 15 rounds with regular sighting. This loss of signal could be (probably is?) a function of old batteries about to go out after an impressively long tour of duty, or the sun could have just been too bright for my eyes (not as good as they used to be) to distinguish the red dot and black target field from the red light … or both.

Either way, the record now includes another 25×25 and “7’s or Better” session, and I got to try out a new set-up with the camera. I like the proximity very much, but the target hits are mostly too hard to see in the shade from the morning light. The new particle board target back worked well enough that I’ll use it every day until there’s not enough left to hold the paper.

I’m glad the time lapse caught some of the flying debris. Those cedar trunks are getting chewed up pretty heavily, but they are doing good work with no pass-throughs.

Shot o’the Day is of the gear I use to make time lapse videos with my iPhone 4.

First and foremost: the app is iTimeLapse, and if I can make it work with only user-image issues and edit-errors left over after just a couple of tries, then it can be used to good effect by almost anyone.

Also important is The Glif. My web-biz partner came across this at kickstarter.com while it was still in design/development/pre-production, and we got our orders in “on the ground floor.” We both like the simplicity and versatility, and I’ve used it like crazy with the tripod screw mount.

Lately, my stand-of-choice is this mini UltraPod rig that I got from an Eddie Bauer outlet store years ago. The position-control is very, very adaptable, and the lock-down is solid. It balances well and supports/distributes weight well.

The top section of this slide-on iPhone cover by Great Shield allows me to use the Glif and helps me pretend that I’m “protecting” my little “golden Apple-item” from possible debris and fragment damage– at least over most of the phone’s surface. The lower section doesn’t quite fit the Glif, and I don’t want to stress/stretch that little gadget out of shape.

All told, this set up costs about $35 today (that’s less than I spent), and it’s about as crucial to the Gun-a-Day blog as the guns and ammo themselves.

Gun-a-Day 34: Chillin’ with My Glock 19C

Cool Under Fire (and Rain)

The weather has almost taken over the whole Gun-a-Day experience. The frozen rain was falling when I pulled in the driveway and got heavier as I bundled up and loaded up and went out to the range. The chunky stuff was clicking and ticking, so I set up quickly, paced off 30 feet, and did some clicking of my own.

That’s one of the best ways I know to shake off the effects of soaking-damp, bone-biting cold air.  By the time I was done making a pile of olive green, Brown Bear cartridge cases around my feet, the precipitation had turned into a fairly light but still cold, steady rain.

As the sleet turned to cold rain and picked up pace, I finished off the 15-round magazine and checked the target board. I couldn’t get a clear sense of the sight placement with any of the shots, really. I wasn’t thrilled to see at least five hits well away from the center ring. It’d be nice to be able to honestly blame it on the ammo, but what good would that do? I can’t get better by whining about my equipment.

Something is up with the 9pm effect, though. I thought maybe yesterday was a fluke, but the same thing happened today: wood chips were flying all over the place. Maybe the .45 slugs just sunk into the tree trunks. The 9mm rounds are really ripping up chunks from the backstop.

The shredded tree trunks shown here are the focus of Shot o’the Day. When the weather breaks, I’ll have to get some time-lapse and slow-mo shots of the wood-spray, “fire(arm)works.”

I wanted to know how I could do at 30 feet, and I found out: not as well as I wanted!

Here’s an idea, though: I’ll try again tomorrow!

Gun-a-Day 32: Charles Daly Field Tactical Shotgun, 12GA

What is a fella to do when there are dead tree trunks to take down and a cold, dark, steady rain falling? It’s not like a guy can just stand around all day with an ax or even take the time to drag out the chain saw. My answer to the need for quick, efficient “tree girdling” in advance of stumping out a dead trunk is to load up the trusty 12GA shotgun and head out into the woods.

Well, that was the plan today anyway … even with extra processing on these photos, it’s obvious that the scene was almost dark as night.

I was home before 5:30, but the cloud cover was so thick and so dark, and the rain had been going on for so long that everything was dark and gloomy and chilling. It wasn’t a good time to set up an extended precision targeting session (as if I could claim any real “precision” at this point), and the dead trees I didn’t get chopped down on Saturday have been creaking and cracking in the back of my mind, so I decided to take a special tool out of the gun closet and venture out– bundled up in rain gear and mud boots– into the cold, drippy, gray-light evening to get some wood cutting done.

On the day I heard, late in 2009?, that Charles Daly was closing up shop (we miss you guys!), I jumped onto gunbroker.com and looked for the best deal I could find on the Field model with stand-off muzzle brake and full pistol grip. And, oy, did I find such a deal!

This was a major add to my collection, especially for home defense purposes. Even with a Taurus Judge and a Kimber .45 and a Bond Arms Ranger II in the house, the addition of a pump shotgun and its classic klink-clatch loading sound was welcome and, as far as these things can be, practical.

I’ve used it very little since the purchase and transfer were completed– just enough to know that it worked, and I bought only a box each of some basic buckshot, some Hornady heavy buck, and one box of Winchester PDX12. Oh my, what a punch that packs.

More than the slugging weight, though, I was really impressed all over again today at what seemed to me to be a very tight pattern made by the Hornady shell on my first shot from about 15 feet. Very tightly packed with no fliers that I could find.  This cheap plastic serving tray is about two feet across, and the load went dead center en masse.

That’s a shot o’the day to remember.

I expected a lot more spray, but maybe that’s just because most of my experience is with dual-use firearms which have rifling for .45LC shooting … whatever the case may be, I feel very confident with this weapon after “slugging it out” with that tree.

Anyway, I needed a fast shooting session, and I want to push this tree trunk over by hand or with just a bit of chopping in a few days, so this stripping and center-punching will have it ready for felling just fine.

Here are the shells I emptied. When I take the tree down, I’m going to try to find the 12GA PDX slugs and dig ’em out. I thought there might be a through and through effect, but there is enough life left in the ground level trunk that all of the shot was swallowed up in the tree.

One note about bad timing: I happened to notice– while I was firing into the tree trunk– that ducks/geese were honking overhead. For all I know, the neighbors figure I was poaching, but– I promise, Officer!– I was shooting withered pines not winged poultry. What a worry-wart I can be …

The front sight fiber optic line matched with the rear sight circle was the perfect combination for this low-light situation (and, so, also for home defense), and the shots went exactly where they were aimed. I worked around the tree, and the bark stripped away nicely.

This might have been a day to give up on the idea of target practice, but I got some good experience with my heaviest hitter and was back inside before either of us was soaked through. A warm leather couch for me and a silicon-infused cloth for the shotgun, and we were both doing fine after our workout.